'Pearl Harbor' Box Office - The Second Wave Strikes

The preliminary box office figures for the weekend are out. Pearl Harbor took in $30 million  about a 50% drop form its opening three day total. While this drop is serious, its actually a few percentage points better than Jurassic Park: The Lost World and Mission: Impossible 2 have done after a Memorial Day opening (but much worse than 'Star Wars: Episode I', although I don't think you can make a fair comparision between 'Pearl' and 'Star Wars'). A trend like this usually means that Pearl will have one more good weekend at the box office. After that, theaters will start pulling screens in anticipation of the next super-hot, but short lived summer blockbuster (Tomb Raider on June 15). Through sheer force of will, Disney could get the total domestic box office up to about $200 million, meaning it will be up to the international market and video sales to determine if the film breaks even or turns a profit.

The other big news was that Shrek was down only 33% - thats considered very good (if not downright excellent. Looking at the day to day totals, Shrek overtook Pearl on Sunday and ended the weekend at with a total box office of $28.5 million (my predication last week came much closer to becoming true than I thought it would). The early projections are that the green guy will out draw the love triangle by a good margin next weekend. Given the apparent staying power of the movie, Shrek will top the $250 million take from Toy Story 2. Some are saying that the ogre could hit as high as The Lion King (around $300 million), but I really dont see that happening.

While Disney has avoided a Godzilla-like bomb, the box office can still only be seen as disappointing, especially considering the pre-release anticipation and the production costs for this film. And the fact that Shrek will make more money just rubs salt into the wounds.

P.S. The Atlantis soundtrack is out now. Very John Williams-like. Im also starting to hear some good things about this movie. Im looking forward to being pleasantly surprised.